Repositionable tape strips or tape flags, such as the widely used Post-It® Flags sold by Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company, have become a staple office supply product throughout the world for temporarily marking portions of documents. Such tape flags are known in the patented prior art. U.S. Pat. No. 4,907,825 (Miles et al.) and U.S. Pat. No. 4,770,320 (Miles et al.), for example, describe a sheet including an elongate layer of flexible polymeric material having a coating of repositionable pressure sensitive adhesive on one of its side surfaces along a second end portion, while being free of adhesive on both of its side surfaces along a first end portion thereof. Such a tape flag or sheet is useful for marking a portion of a document by having its second end portion adhered thereto while its first end portion projects beyond an edge of the document so that the marked portion of the document can be readily identified.
Tape flags have generally been provided with repositionable adhesive to allow the tape flags to be repositioned or removed from a document without damaging the document. This has led to the perception, however, that such tape flags may inadvertently become detached from a document. This is of particular concern when marking certain documents such as important medical and legal documents. As a result, a need exists for a tape flag that can be securely adhered to a document but which can also be cleanly removed therefrom without damaging the document.
It would therefore be desirable to provide a tape flag that can be securely adhered to a document using an adhesive having an adhesive strength greater than that of a repositionable adhesive but which can be cleanly removed from the document without damaging it.